The Second World War To the Present

1. The Second World War To the Present

2. Pre-war attitudes (see Drift towards World War II handout)

3. Isolationism Neutrality Act (1935)

4. Gradual shift toward involvement

5. Cash and Carry Destroyer Deal Lend-Lease Act (repealed Neutrality Act)

6. Relations with Japan Japanese fears concerning resources, etc.

7. Pearl Harbor U.S. Enters War

8. The Home Front Some important wartime agencies

9. War Production Board Organized and coordinated industries to make quick, efficient transition to production of war materials. No consumer autos were built during war.

10. Office of War Information Responsible for maintaining morale – positive propaganda

11. Office of Price Administration Set prices, rationed goods, fought inflation and black market – assured military needs were met

12. War Labor Board Settled disputes between business and labor Avoided strikes and maintained morale

13. Fair Employment Practices Committee Prevented employer discrimination against workers Foundation for the civil rights movement of the 1950s

14. Conduct of war Two front war for the U.S. Europe first (See War Strategy H/O)

15. World War II Allies Included Great Britain, Free France, the USSR, and nationalist China.

16. Conferences Casablanca, Cairo, Teheran: Planned war strategy Yalta: (1945) planned post-war strategies

17. PostwarPeriod Service men’s readjustment act of 1944 (GI Bill) The United Nations Post-War Organization favored big winners

18. The Cold War

19. The Truman Doctrine Pledged aid to Greece and Turkey Containment policy Intended to keep communism within its original borders

20. Marshall Plan Offered recovery assistance to all European countries Communist countries declined

21. Berlin Blockade Soviets block land access U.S. responds by air

22. NATO Designed to block or contain Communists, especially Soviet, expansion Ignored George Washington’s advice against permanent alliances Cold War

23. Communist victory in China Nationalists flee to Taiwan Government there recognized as China by the United States and the U.N. until Nixon

24. Korean War Communist North Korea attacks South Korea, the U.N. responds Armistice terms restore status quo

25. SEATO Southeast Asia Treaty Organization is the Pacific equivalent to NATO

26. France, Dien Bien Phu, and our involvement in Vietnam Antiwar demonstrations and Jane Fonda

27. Hungarian Revolt Soviets crush Hungarian revolution

28. Aswan Dam Soviets assist Egypt in building the dam U.S. and Britain offered first but withdrew the offer

29. Suez Canal seizure Egypt takes control, France, Britain and Israel invade, U.S. and Soviets stop them Superpower “diplomacy” at work

30. Eisenhower Doctrine Offers aid to Middle Eastern countries who feel threatened by communism

31. U-2 incident U.S. spy plane shot down over Soviet territory

32. Independence of African nations Civil Wars break out all over

33. Cuban Revolution Castro takes over, announces communist regime, relations with the U.S. deteriorate

34. Bay of Pigs Cuban refugees, backed by the United States fail to overthrow Castro

35. Berlin Wall Soviets seal off East Berlin with physical Wall

36. Cuban Missile Crisis Soviets attempt to place missiles in Cuba. The U.S. blockades

37. The “Hotline” Direct link between U.S. and USSR intended to divert nuclear disaster First used during six day war

38. Nuclear test ban treaty Allowed only underground testing

39. Outer Space treaty Banned the military bases weapons and weapons tests in outer space

40. Nuclear nonproliferation treaty Banned the spread of nuclear weapons among signatory nations

41. VIETNAM, 1946-75 (the 10 000 Day War)

42. PHASE 1 - A WAR OF COLONIAL INDEPENDENCE AGAINST THE FRENCH • Vietnam had been a French colony under the name of French Indochina (along with Cambodia and Laos) • Vietnam began to fight for its independence from France during WW II ( when France was preoccupied with European conflict) • the Vietnamese revolutionary leader was Ho Chi Minh, a Communist • wanted to be the leader of an independent, communist Vietnam; Ho received support from both the USSR and “Red” China

43. this colonial war raged from 1946-54, culminating in the French defeat at Dienbienphu • Fr. decided it wanted out and called a peace conference in Geneva, Switzerland (attended by France, Vietnam, the US, and the USSR) • the decision of the conference was to partition Vietnam into a communist North led by Ho and a “democratic” South Vietnam led by Ngo Dinh Diem • the settlement was an outgrowth of basic Cold War tensions between the Americans and Soviets and clearly reflected the US policy of containment with respect to Soviet communist expansionism • the US had come to see South Vietnam as a “domino” that they couldn’t afford to lose

44. PHASE 2 – AMERICAN ESCALATION AND MILITARY INVOLVEMENT • this phase originated with Ike” and JFK but was intensified under Lyndon Baines Johnson (LBJ), who assumed the presidency afterJFK’s assassination • The U.S. never formally issued a declaration of war, but after the Gulf of Tonkin Incident, where 2 American destroyers were apparently fired upon by the North Vietnamese, Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolutions (August 1964)- hereCongress gave LBJ their support in sending American personnel and materiel

45. in spite of ongoing escalation throughout the 1960s, the US experienced a lack of success against the Vietnamese guerrilla forces in S. Vietnam (the Vietcong) as the US Army was unprepared for their tactics and mentality • The US was also never entirely successful in shutting down the Ho Chi Minh Trail, a supply line that ran between North and South Vietnam via difficult jungle terrain, often underground and through neighboring nations like Cambodia

46. the war definitely turned against the US in 1968, when the NVA’s General Giap began the Tet Offensive, a surprise offensive on a major Vietnamese holiday that saw attacks all over the country, including in Saigon itself • ongoing US casualties and losses saw an increase in antiwar sentiment on the American Home Front, in large part because Vietnam was a TV War where American audiences saw the brutality of war firsthand

47. this included American atrocities at My Lai (Lieutenant Calley) • they also witnessed the usage of weapons like napalm and Agent Orange, which devastated the environment

48. as the Counterculture gathered momentum (Hippies, Flower Children, etc.), protests became widespread and began to polarize the nation • this was intensified after the Kent State Massacre • National Guardsmen opened fire on student protestors in Ohio, killing four, and by Senator William Fulbright’s (Chairman of the Senate Armed Forces Committee) admission that the war was a “mess”

49. increasingly the American people came to perceive the “Credibility Gap”, i.e. they no longer believed that LBJ was telling them the truth about events in the war • in 1968, LBJ chose not to run for president, and Republican Richard M. Nixon was elected on a platform of “Peace with Honour”

50. Nixon wanted the South Vietnamese to play a greater role in the war, a policy he labeled Vietnamization • in spite of that, he continues carpet bombing Hanoi and orders a secret invasion of Cambodia • He relied on the diplomacy of Henry Kissinger to achieve peace and/or an American withdrawal • the US does manage to extricate itself by Jan. 27, 1973